“Don’t hurt the dog!” Nick yelled, eyeing a German shepherd that looked a hell of a lot like Rosco running from the blaze.
Gabriel raised an eyebrow in his direction.
“What?” Nick flipped a rude hand gesture. “The dog isn’t to blame. He’s an innocent animal.”
“I assure you, my brother will avoid harming any innocent animals.” He raised two fingers and motioned toward the building. “Now, get in there and help me find my sister.”
* * *
Darkness closed in on Rowan,and she gasped for breath under Malvern’s weight. Although her bound wrists were crushed between their bodies, he was still too close, the bite too intimate. The vampire’s mouth was sealed around the wound on her neck and he’d been rhythmically swallowing for what seemed like forever but was probably only a matter of minutes. She felt like an antelope caught in a lion’s jaws, pinned under the beast with its teeth buried in her flesh, the animal stink of him sinking into her skin.
She wanted to fight him. Desperately, she wanted to. But Rowan’s strength had flowed out of her along with her blood. She was immortal, but the enchanted bindings at her wrists and ankles were restraining her magic and keeping her body from recovering. Her skin turned hot, then icy cold from blood loss. Did he plan to drain her completely? It was likely.
“Malvern, you must stop. You’re killing me,” she rasped.
At last his fangs slid out of her flesh, and she felt his tongue lap grotesquely over the wound.
“You…” His face came into view above her, his ghostly pale features and small, cutting eyes turning her stomach. This close, he looked dead and reeked of old blood. Even with the blush her blood had provided him, he was nothing more than a corpse. He licked his lips and closed his eyes. “Your blood is such a rush.”
“You’ve taken too much,” she croaked, her tongue dry as sandpaper. “Release my bindings so that I can heal or there will be no more blood for you to drink.”
He frowned and shifted his weight so that he was lying beside her on the bed, his cold, hard body stretched out against her. He ran his long nails down the outside of her arm and hooked his finger in the binding around her wrists. “You want me to remove these?”
“Yes.” She sent him a pleading look. She was so weak. Even if he did release her, she wasn’t sure she could shift or fight him off in her current state. Not immediately. She shivered as his icy-cold fingers traveled over her hip and down the outside of her leg.
“You are an exceptional specimen. I never knew dragons existed. We all thought you were a myth.” His words were slightly slurred and his lids heavy, almost as if her blood had made him drunk.
She shivered with disgust as his nails continued to trace over her skin. “Please. I’m not well.” Her voice was barely a whisper, but it was the only weapon she had left. She had to appeal to logic. She must convince him she was worth more alive. “If you release me, I can recover and my blood will last longer.”
His hands trailed lower, over the silk charmeuse fabric of her dress, her hip, her thigh. She hated that Malvern was touching her. Oddly, it made her think of Nick, how she washisand how only his hands should be allowed on her skin. She hated Malvern and wished she was herself so she could fry him in the fire of her own breath. But she was helpless.
His nails scraped along her calves and then his fingers went to work between her ankles. Once Malvern had succeeded in untying the bindings around her legs, Rowan couldn’t help but release a sigh of relief. She stretched her legs and flexed her ankles. The skin was sore, but it would heal.
“Now my wrists. I’ll heal. I’ll be worth more to you well.” She tried to sound sincere and held her wrists out to Malvern.
A wicked smile spread his lips, and he slowly shook his head. “Worth. What are you worth? What could the Forebears ever give me that would adequately compensate me for this?” His eyes raked over her, and he dragged a thumb along the corner of his mouth. “I want you to myself and for myself. And if they will force you from me, I will have you first. I will have you until no one else can. I will be the last to have you.”
She shook her head. “No. No, Malvern.”
But he had already used the rope he’d pulled from her ankles to thread through the bindings at her wrists and the wrought iron headboard. He forced her hands above her head, leaving her exposed. What little comfort she’d had from the protection of her bindings was now gone.
“You’re beautifully pale,” he said, grabbing her bottom jaw. “Pale as a vampire. Can you be turned, I wonder? You’d make a lovely vampire.”
She stiffened and turned her head away as he leaned down as if to kiss her. He hissed at the side of her jaw, his body coming to rest on top of her again, his knee forcing its way between her own.
“No. The Forebears cannot have you. I will keep you. I will break you.”
He squeezed her jaw and forced her to look at him, just as the house shook and the sound of gunfire tore through the dimly lit room.
Chapter Thirty-One
The gun kicked in Nick’s hands as he sprayed the vampires in front of the mansion with bullets. Thanks to the runway bordered with fire Tobias had laid for them, Nick had made it to the front porch rather easily, Gabriel at his side. But a second wave of security guards had stormed them from both sides. Unlike the coven’s human security contingent, these were vampires and more committed.
While Gabriel John Wick-ed his way through the attackers in front of him, a pistol in each hand, his taloned wings working overtime to shred vampires, Nick backed toward the door, shooting anything that snuck by the dragon’s killing blows. Rowan hadn’t exaggerated; Gabriel was a killing machine. He’d clearly been trained for this.
As for Nick, in all his years in law enforcement, he’d never been in a situation quite like this one. Yes, he’d been shot at, but not like this. This was war. Thank God whatever Harriet had given him was filling in where his skills and abilities fell short. He’d become an excellent shot and was dodging bullets withMatrix-like maneuvers he could have never pulled off yesterday.Pop, pop, pop.Vampire headsexploded like watermelons under a sledgehammer.A vampire to his left pulled a gun, and Nick finished him in a heartbeat.
Tobias roared and scorched the earth in front of Gabriel, cutting off the vampires who raced in from God knew where to join their brethren. Nick reached the front door and threw it open. A flash of fang dropped from the general direction of the chandelier. He wedged his gun under the creature’s jaw and sent its brains into the stratosphere. Two more attacked from the left while one charged straight at him. He put a bullet through the first one’s head, kicked the second one in the teeth, and impaled the third one with a wooden stake he drew from the holster on his leg. Number two sat up, a dark-haired male roughly the size of a bear, and Nick got a horrific view of the dining room through a two-inch hole in its abdomen. He aimed for the head, pulled the trigger.Click. Nothing happened.
